proven HIV harm reduction strategies like needleexchange and in avoiding specific reference to targetpopulations like commercial sex workers. Butaccording to an NGO observer, few conservativegroups attended, and both PEPFAR and the Bushadministrations emphasis on abstinence-until-mar-riage perspective were criticized by other nations atthe gathering.The strength of the final declaration was dimin-ished, not so much by challenges to language, but bythe assemblys unwillingness to be more ambitiousin its commitments to fighting HIV/AIDS. Even when the Bush Administration fails tochange the content of international declarations, thepower of the purse gives the United States consider-able influence over manyinternational programs. In2003 and again in 2005, theU.S. House of Represen-tatives blocked $500 mil-lion in international familyplanning funds destined forthe United Nations Popu-lation Fund (UNFPA), falselyclaiming that the fundswould go to Chinese womenaborting pregnancies tocomply with Chinas one family, one child popula-tion policy.35 In 2002, the United States also froze $3million in aid to the World Health Organization,because the UN agency conducts research on safeabortion techniques.A Bumpy RoadEfforts to insert an anti-choice platform at the UNhave been uneven. In 2001, when Bush overruledthen Secretary of State Colin Powell by attempting toappoint John Klink to be the Assistant Secretary ofState for Population, Refugees, and Migration, theplan collapsed in the face of widespread criticism.Klink had been the Vaticans representative at theUN for six years and was an opponent of condomuse for HIV prevention and reproductive health serv-ices for refugee women. At a February 2005 confer-ence marking the 10th anniversary of the BeijingConference on the Status of Women, official U.S. del-egates failed in their effort to remove references tothe right to reproductive health on the grounds itreferred to abortion rights but still reaffirmed sup-port for the declarations made in Beijing.36But all was not lost for anti-choice supporters.During the January 2006 Congressional holidayrecess, Bush appointed the chief of the U.S. delega-tion, Ellen Sauerbrey, a former Bush campaignworker and anti-choice representative at the UN, tothe State Department position he tried to fill withJohn Klink. Like otherrecess appointments, thisone occurred without theconventional approval ofCongress. Womens healthand human rights advocatesworldwide expressed out-rage, but the deed was done.Since her appointment,Sauerbrey has been im-mersed in refugee issues andhas not been visible at UNevents dealing with reproductive rights.In November of 2005 the UN Human RightsCommittee (UNHRC), an 18-member group thatmonitors the implementation of the UNs humanrights covenants, decided in its first abortion case,KL v. Peru, that abortion is a human right. Thisdecision affirmed the work of international womenshealth advocates who have been describing the dis-crimination and deprivation many women experi-ence across the globe as the result solely of theirbeing women. The UNHRC decision sent anti-choice NGOsinto tailspins. Austin Ruse stubbornly declared inhis Friday Fax that the committees decision was notonly an example of flawed reasoning but was alsonon-binding.37UNd o i n g R e p r o d u c t i v e Fr e e d o mChristian Right NGOs Target the United NationsPOLITICAL RESEARCH ASSOCIATES 200610Even when the BushAdministration fails to changethe content of internationaldeclarations, the power of thepurse gives the United Statesconsiderable influence overmany international programs.35U.S. Department of State, Report of the China UN Population Fund (UNPFA) Independent Assessment Team,May 29, 2002, http://www.state.gov/g/prm/rls/rpt/2002/12122.htm.36Goldenberg, Suzanne. American Urges UN to Renounce Abortion Rights. Guardian, March 1, 2005.http://www.globalpolicy.org/empire/un/2005/0301abortion.htm.37C-Fam Friday Fax, December 9, 2005, at http://www.c-fam.org/FAX/Volume_8/faxv8n51.html.